Nowadays, it seems like every major crypto app wants to be the “everything app” or the “super app.”
To build that vision, teams add feature after feature until an overwhelming array of options is at every user’s fingertips. Trading, perps, lending, memecoins, NFTs, launchpads, prediction markets...
It never ends!
But, despite what you may assume from a stacked features roster, these apps are designed for a very narrow user base: people who are crypto-native, very tolerant to risk, and always looking for the next trade.
Why?
Because when that type of user is incentivized for increased in-app activity, they’re heavily inclined to swap more, stack on leverage, and bet on the big game, inevitably resulting in losses.
For the app owners, it’s a phenomenal system for transferring user funds into their own wallets.
Gains and losses aside, for the vast majority of people, these apps would create anxiety, confusion, and sadness around their finances.
And that’s because, deep down, these people don’t want to check their perps positions at 3 am. They do not want to research which memecoin might 100x. And they definitely don’t want to think about liquidation warnings for hours each day.
What most people in the world want is a safe place to grow their money over time in a set-it-and-forget-it way.
But crypto has not built anything for them. Until now.
For Those Left Behind
We set out to build an app that could flip the script on crypto apps - an “anti super app” of sorts that could help protect users from making costly mistakes instead of encouraging them to happen.
To keep app development mission-aligned, we've thought about every potential new feature through a simple filter: does this help someone build wealth patiently, or does it create a new way to lose money quickly?
If it is the latter, it does not make it into the app.
While super apps emphasize having an enormous list of what users can do, we’re emphasizing what users can’t do in our app.
Super apps make finance fast, aggressive, and short-term. We’re slowing it down and looking long-term.
Super apps want their users to trade every asset in as many ways as possible. We only want to let our users buy a few… and just hold them.
Making decisions like those is how we're building the app for the people crypto left behind.
Why Less Is Actually More
Just because we chose simplicity does not mean we chose to sacrifice the performance that matters under the hood.
Sanctum users are still plugged into the kind of DeFi yields that traditional bank accounts simply cannot offer. The key here is that we deliver those returns without asking anyone to become a full-time portfolio manager to access them!
There’s also a positive mental impact.
When you strip away the craziness of today’s fast-paced finance, people stop making impulsive decisions with their money. A calmer experience leads to clearer thinking, and clearer thinking leads to better financial outcomes.
Instead of filling the app with more features that create more ways to lose money, we lean into light gamification that rewards the habits actually worth building.
Let's Grow Gardens
Through Sanctum, we hope that crypto starts to feel a bit different for you.
We want to show you that it doesn’t have to feel like a second job, and that it most definitely doesn’t have to feel like you’re in an endless casino.
In Sanctum, it can feel like planting a garden:
Something you tend calmly, that grows steadily, and that provides a calm path to holding good assets and letting time do the work for your wealth.